If this is your first visit, be sure to
check out the FAQ by clicking the
link above. You may have to register
before you can post: click the register link above to proceed. To start viewing messages,
select the forum that you want to visit from the selection below.

SNIP
~~~~~~~~~
TO ALL THE KIDS WHO SURVIVED THE
1930s, '40s, '50s, '60s and '70s!!

First, we survived being born to mothers who may have smoked and/or drank while they were pregnant They took aspirin, ate blue cheese dressing, tuna from a can, and didn't get tested for diabetes.Then, after that trauma, we were put to sleep on our tummies in baby cribs covered with bright colored lead-based paints.

We had no childproof lids on medicine bottles, locks on doors or cabinets, and, when we rode our bikes, we had baseball caps, not helmets, on our heads.
As infants and children, we would ride in cars with no car seats, no booster seats, no seat belts, no air bags, bald tires and sometimes no brakes.

Riding in the back of a pick- up truck on a warm day was always a special treat.
We drank water from the garden hose and not from a bottle. We shared one soft drink with four friends, from one bottle, and no one actually died from this.

We ate cupcakes, white bread, real butter, and bacon. We drank Kool-Aid made with real white sugar. And we weren't overweight..
WHY?Because we were always outside playing...that's why!

We would leave home in the morning and play all day, as long as we were back when the streetlights came on.
No one was able to reach us all day.
--And, we were OKAY.

We would spend hours building
our go-carts out of scraps and then ride them down the hill, only to find out we forgot the brakes... After running into the bushes a few times, we learned to solve the problem.

We did not have Play Stations, Nintendos and X boxes. There were no video games, no 150 channels on cable, no video movies or DVDs, no surround-sound or CDs, no cell phones, no personal computers, no Internet and no chat rooms...

WE HAD FRIENDS
and we went outside and found them!

We fell out of trees, got cut, broke bones and teeth, and there were no lawsuits from those accidents.
We would get spankings with wooden spoons, switches, ping-pong paddles, or just a bare hand, and no one would call child services to report abuse.
We ate worms, and mud pies made from dirt, and the worms did not live in us forever.
We were given BB guns for our 10th birthdays, made up games with sticks and tennis balls, and
-although we were told it would happen- we did not put out very many eyes.

We rode bikes or walked to a friend's house and knocked on the door or rang the bell, or just walked in and talked to them.
Little League had tryouts and not everyone made the team.
Those who didn't had to learn to deal with disappointment. Imagine that!!
The idea of a parent bailing us out if we broke the law was unheard of. They actually sided with the law!

These generations have produced some of the best risk-takers, problem solvers, and inventors ever.
The past 50 to 85 years have seen an explosion of innovation and new ideas..
We had freedom, failure, success and responsibility, and we learned how to deal with it all.

If YOU are one of those born between 1925-1970, CONGRATULATIONS!
You might want to share this with others who have had the luck to grow up as kids before the lawyers and the government regulated so much of our lives for our own good.
While you are at it, forward it to your kids, so they will know how brave and lucky their parents were.
Kind of makes you want to run through the house with scissors, doesn't it ?
~~~~~~~
The quote of the month by
Jay Leno:
"With hurricanes, tornados, fires out of control, mud slides, flooding, severe thunderstorms tearing up the country from one end to another, and with the threat of bird flu and terrorist attacks, are we sure this is a good time to take God out of the Pledge of Allegiance?"

For those that prefer to think that God is not watching over us.....go ahead and delete this.
For the rest of us. ...pass this on...

Well, I don't believe in God, but I can get behind just about everything else in that post.

I'm a 59er. I'm glad of it. It was a good time to be a kid in the UK and US. Things only started to turn to shit in the mid 70s. By then, I was nearly all growed up.

I'd hate to be a child growing up now. Fuckin' nanny state bullshit. We're raising a generation of Nintendo corn-fed pussies now.

Amen.

"The efforts of the government alone will never be enough. In the end the people must choose and the people must help themselves" ~ JFK; from his famous inauguration speech (What Democrats sounded like before today's neo-Liberals hijacked that party)

At 71, I think I've seen the best the Nation has had to offer; from WW2 to President Reagan. I'm tired now.

You're only a kid,keep going and if you're tired take a nap. Make it a habit to have a few drinks of a day and always remember the longer you live the sooner you'll bloody well die and .... "You'll Be a Long Time Dead" !

Army Men and Black Cat firecrackers. Glass Kerknockers remember those? Lawn darts, the real ones with metal tips. Dodgeball. At my elementary school we had a metal slide 20 feet high. We would put WD40 on an old shop rag and make a few runs down the slide on it.

We had BB guns and used to go into the woods and play War. Nobody thought twice about a bunch of kids carrying BB guns. Then again, I grew up on military bases. To me a civie was someone waiting to go through MEPS.